Turkey-Russia gas pipeline deal has stalled, Deputy Undersecretary at the Ministry of Energy & Natural Resources of Turkey said.

“Negotiations with Russia have reached a deadlock,” Sefa Sadik Aytekin said. “Russians consider price negotiation for gas supplies between OAO Gazprom and Turkish Botas to be a precondition. We, on the other hand, consider it to be a starting point.”

According to the Turkish official, the result would have been much better, had Russia made a discount without preconditions.

The Turkish Stream is a working name of the proposed natural gas pipeline from the Russian Federation to Turkey across the Black Sea. The proposal was announced by Russian president Vladimir Putin on 1 December 2014, during his state visit to Turkey. The proposed pipeline should replace the cancelled South Stream project.

The planned capacity of the pipeline is 63 billion cubic metres per annum (2.2 trillion cubic feet per annum) of natural gas. Turkey would take about 14 billion cubic metres per annum (490 billion cubic feet per annum), the rest of the gas is planned to be exported to Europe.